


Thrift Shopping

by Magpiie



Category: American Gods (TV)
Genre: Gen, Novelty Clothing, Thrift Shopping, dumb but fun, very subtle madwife
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-17
Updated: 2019-11-17
Packaged: 2021-02-07 21:44:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21465019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magpiie/pseuds/Magpiie
Summary: Laura, Salim and Sweeney discover an exciting source of American surrealism in the form of thrift shops. I saw a funny t-shirt on the ShiftyThrifting Tumblr and was inspired.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28





	Thrift Shopping

"Hey asshole, wake up."  
Sweeney, finding himself sprawled awkwardly across the back seats of the cab, opened one eye and peered at the figure leaning against the car door. Laura was holding a couple of bags out to him, one paper and one plastic, and he eyed them with a confused trepidation.  
"What's that?" he asked, hungover and hoarse.  
"Breakfast. And a shirt. You're welcome."  
A bemused glance down revealed that the shirt he was currently wearing had been torn (or maybe slashed open) down the middle, and was peppered with little spots of blood. His undershirt was similarly destroyed. Distant memories of the night before began to surface, and he pushed himself to sit upright and took the bags from her.  
"A gift? For me? Dead Wife, you shouldn't have." With a dismissive eye-roll at his dumb grin, Laura shut the door and slipped back into the passenger seat next to Salim, who was sipping at a bottle of orange juice and listening to the morning radio. There was a rustle of plastic behind her, then a heavy sigh. When he spoke again, his voice was flat and unamused. "Oh. You really shouldn't have."  
"You don't like it?" she asked with mock hurt, turning to grin at his scowl.  
"Where the fuck did you get this?"  
"It was two dollars in the thrift store. What, were you expecting Gucci?" Salim, finally admitting to himself that he couldn't ignore them any longer, turned to Laura.  
"What is it?"  
"It is," Laura began, struggling to hide her grin, "a perfectly good T-shirt that I bought myself, out of the kindness of my heart, for my good friend Sweeney." The ungrateful recipient of said T-shirt grimaced, and Laura turned back to face the windscreen. "Hurry up and change, you attract enough attention as it is without looking like you just crawled out of a fight." Sweeney grumbled something under his breath but stripped off his ruined garments anyway. Salim watched Laura, biting her lip to keep herself from laughing, and said nothing when she cast a brief, casual glance at the rearview mirror.  
"I hate this," Sweeney huffed, and Salim turned to see him wearing a tight white shirt that proclaimed 'Jesus is my jam' in fun navy lettering. The involuntary burst of laughter caused him to choke on his juice, and he dissolved into a spluttering, cackling mess in the driver's seat. Sweeney's furious glare shifted from him to Laura, who smirked with a deep satisfaction.  
"Think of all the new friends you'll make, with a shirt like that."  
"You are an intolerable fucking bitch."

Investigating thrift stores, gift shops and weird corners of gas stations fast became Laura's new favourite pastime.  
"What do you think?" she had asked them one day, striking a dramatic modelling pose in her new purchase. "Isn't it terrible?" The other two had looked up, Sweeney from rolling a cigarette and Salim from puzzling over a book of sudoku, and frowned at her.  
"If you can't eat it, smoke it or snort it, then fuck it," Sweeney read aloud. "That's the worst thing I've ever seen. I want it, trade me for the stupid Jesus one."  
"Nope."

Salim started joining her on these little shopping trips and began building up a small collection of increasingly surreal merchandise for the movie Space Jam, which he had never seen and hoped he never would. Laura started buying trashy romance novels and reading them aloud while they drove for light comic relief. (In one case they had actually gotten quite involved with one of the stories, and sat in profound silence for several minutes when it was done, and then very deliberately never spoken about it again.) She also made a point of purchasing every novelty Bible she could find, and one day found Sweeney reading one aimed at 'extreme teens' with a cigarette in his hand and a look of baffled consternation on his face. 

One day, Salim had noted with some surprise that it was his birthday, and that night Sweeney had found him leaning against the railing outside of his motel room and silently handed him a bag. With no small amount of distrust, Salim had reached into the bag and produced a black fleece jacket with "Just Call Me Asskicker" embroidered on the breast in cursive teal letters.  
"This is…" he breathed, as if he'd truly been handed a thoughtful gift and not just this hilarious trash.  
"It's really something, isn't it? Don't tell her I got you a birthday present or I'll never hear the fucking end of it."

When they had finally crossed paths with Wednesday et al again, he'd studied them all with a withering gaze.  
"Jesus is your jam, Sweeney? Really?"  
"It's very sophisticated humour. Don't expect you to understand." Actually, he still hated the thing. The truth was that it fit him extremely snug and he had once noticed Laura surreptitiously looking at his shoulders in the tight sleeves, and now wore it as often as possible.  
Shadow had frowned at Laura for a very long. She wore a Christmas sweater that read 'move over Santa, here comes grandma'. Finally, in a very defeated voice, he had just said,  
"Laura, it's September."  
"Salim, what are you wearing?" the Jinn had asked, a soft chuckle to his low voice, and Salim had bitten back a laugh and told him,  
"I go by Asskicker now."


End file.
